Things that make me go hmm…

I think I finally settled on a New Year’s Resolution

Hope that it’s not too late for this…I think I finally settled on something that I can work on for the year. Those of you who regularly read my blog know that I have a page called “What I’m Reading.” At the end of the year, I take each page and rename it as the Booklist for the year. Like a lot of people, I’m perennially challenged to catch up on my reading. Two stacks of books are collecting dust in my home. I’ve even lent one of booksout to three different friends, and still haven’t read it myself. It’s high time that I try to chip away at this stack.

Here’s the list of books for this year’s challenge. Let’s see how many of them make the “What I’m Reading” page.

Composing a Life by Mary Catherine Bateson

Master of the Crossroads by Madison Smartt Bell (This is the book that I lent out three times, and still haven’t read it myself.)

The Tragic Black Buck: Racial Masquerading in the American Literary Imagination by Carlyle Van Thompson

Dark Matter: A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora edited by Sheree R.Thomas

The Prince of Frogtown by Rick Bragg

The Techniques of Effective Reading by Edward J. Quinn (Maybe I should read this one first?)

Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell

The People of Clarendon County: A Play by Ossie Davis

Off the Charts: Ruthless Days and Reckless Nights Inside the Music Industry by Bruce Haring

The City Out My Window: 63 Views on New York by Matteo Pericoli

Farm Aid: A Song for America edited by Holly George-Warren

Fourteen books; ten months.

And that’s just the tippy-tip of the iceberg. There’s about 50 books on my Kindle. And I’ve got a bunch of book lists floating around in different areas:

130 books on my Amazon wishlist.

5 books on my Barnes & Noble wishlist.

55 books on an Evernote file.

A running handwritten list that I’m afraid to count.

100 books on an Excel spreadsheet (converted from my Palm Pilot).

30 books on the wishlist at the Queensboro Public Library.

So that’s the tip of the iceberg. What lies beneath the surface is my For Later list at the New York Public Library, which had close to 400 items when I printed it in January, but quickly went past that mark. Oh yea, and my audiobook wishlist is also on NYPL, which is 70 items. That’s close to 500 books!

The thought that I will probably end up leaving my booklists as an inheritance to my children has crossed my mind on more than one occasion. I would probably need to quit my present job and read full-time in order to make a significant dent in this list. When I was in my 20s, I read about one book a week; at that pace, it would take me about 13 years to get through the list, assuming that I don’t add any more books. These days, I’m lucky to get through a book in a couple of weeks.

But where there’s life, there’s hope. So I will try. And if someone out there has a larger wishlist than I do, I’d sure like to hear from you!